CHAPTER V.
EARLY SPEECHES OF DEMOSTHENES ON FOREIGN POLICY.
Persia in the fourth century B.C. was a more considerable power than we might have supposed from the comparative ease with which it was overthrown by Alexander. The Great King, as he was always called, was in the possession of immense resources. Financially he was much stronger than the Greek world, though his military inferiority had been more than once clearly proved. He was still looked on by the Greeks generally with a sort of wondering awe. He ruled in some fashion a vast empire, and held it together by means of satraps and vassal princes, notwithstanding occasional serious revolts. He had had indeed, in past days, to acknowledge the independence of the Asiatic Greeks; still he was always distinctly felt as a force in Greek politics, with which from time to time he was brought into contact. On the whole, he was regarded as an enemy; but the unfortunate want of anything like hearty union among the states of Greece tended to weaken this feeling, and to make combined action against him all but impossible. There was always, however, a vague fear that he might some day, if violently provoked, crush
